What About
by CelticInTheAU
Summary: A class assignment makes the group think deeply about what matters most to them. For FandomsFighttheFloods - Australian Flood Relief appeal.


Twilight

_What About...?_

Author Name: TearyJewelEyes  
>FanFiction address: <span>.netu/1337140/TearyJewelEyes  
>Story Rating: M [for suggestiveness]<br>Pairing: Bella/Rose, Jasper/Edward, Alice/Emmett  
>Summary: A class assignment makes the group think deeply about what matters most to them. For FandomsFighttheFloods. Might have a second part later.<p>

Disclaimer: The characters used in this piece are property of S.M and her Twilight Saga "franchise".

**This was written for the FandomsFightTheFloods [Fandoms4Floods on twitter] compilation, raising money for the Queensland/Victoria flood relief fund, for the catastrophic weather that happened in Dec 2010 and into Jan and Feb of 2011. Australia is my home land, so this was close to my heart. I hope you enjoy my Twilight contribution to this wonderful cause.**

"This sucks." For once, I agreed with my pixie of a best friend, Alice Brandon. We had just walked out of our English classroom, where we had been given the world's crappiest assignment. Don't get me wrong, I love English, so much in fact that I wanted to do a degree in it and become an author, or at least a book editor. But it was things like this that made me seethe at the thoughts of our public education teachers.

"Alice, I think you're onto something," spoke my teddy-bear of a brother, Emmett. He wasn't actually my brother, but at times we were so close, you could have sworn we were twins. Emmett McCarty was the best guy friend a girl could ask for. He was quick-witted and funny, and protected his friends when they were threatened. Of course, his main priority was Alice, his girlfriend, but because our gang was so close, he couldn't help but extend the invitation to the rest of us.

Our gang consisted of six people, all born within two months of each other. I suppose we could start with me. My name is Isabella Swan, but I much prefer the name Bella. I'm a pretty plain girl – brown, waist length hair, pallid skin, brown eyes, and I'm not wonderfully tall. I'm 17 years old, and I just had my birthday back on September 13. I love reading and writing, but the thing I love most of all is my girlfriend of two years, and another member of our infamous gang, Rosalie Hale.

Rosalie was the model of perfection. You'd think I was only saying this because I'm dating her, but everyone else has the same thoughts. She's your classic blonde bombshell – big tits, round ass, long legs, perfectly straight, breast length hair; clear, tan complexion and sapphire colored eyes. But she wasn't blonde in terms of her attitude. If anything, she had the personality of a redhead – fiery, snappy, sarcastic, and one of the smartest girls around. She loved to restore old cars, and she loved to play the guitar. She had the most fuckawesome electric blue Fender Strat, which she got for her 17th birthday, back on August 29.

The next in the pack was my best friend in the whole world, Alice. We called her "Pixie" because she was so short – barely five feet tall, and she has short, spiky black hair that went along with most fable-esque sketches of the supernatural creatures. She has soft, honey colored eyes which stand out against her pale skin. Alice had her birthday yesterday – 26th September – throwing the town's biggest party since the old high-school teacher everyone loved left. She, like the rest of our gang, is 17, and she is the baby of us all.

As I said, Emmett McCarty is Alice's boyfriend. He's a hulk of a man, over six and a half feet tall, but you can tell he's one of the sweetest guys on the planet by his mop of curly brown hair, shining grey eyes and his dimpled cheeks. Sure, the guy had muscles, but he used them for football and hugging. We called him a teddy-bear because he was so good at giving hugs. Emmett's birthday was the 15th August, making him the second oldest, yet the most protective in the gang.

Jasper Whitlock made up member number five. He was pretty much a male version of Rosalie - supermodel looks, wavy blonde hair that fell just short of his shoulders, sparkling blue eyes, tan skin, tall and muscular. The freaky thing was he even shared a birthday with Rosalie, but upon digging up information of this strange coincidence, it was found out that it was just that – a coincidence that two children who were virtually mirror images of each other were born on the same day.

The last person in our group was Edward Masen, Jasper's boyfriend. Yes, there are two same sex couples in our little group, and to be honest, we don't give a flying fuck. Edward and I came out at the same time to our group, back when we were 14. Rosalie and Jasper came out a year later. Edward was one of the most beautiful – and yes, I do mean _beautiful__**, **_not handsome – men I had ever seen. His tall lanky frame was topped off with what you could only call bronze sex-hair. It was always perfectly tousled and never had any product in it. He had pale skin like Alice, and jade green eyes which he inherited from his father - Edward Sr. He was textbook definition of the perfect man for Jasper. Edward was the oldest of us all, celebrating his birthday on August 10.

But back to what Alice, Emmett and I were whining about. We had left the English class and were walking to the cafeteria for lunch, moaning about the stupid ass assignment as Rosalie, Edward and Jasper kept suspiciously quiet. Normally they were the ones to moan along with Alice and Emmett about English assignments, but somehow the roles had been switched.

"How can she expect us to give a seven minute speech on something that we're passionate about _and_ relate it to a song, lyrics included, in only one weekend?" Alice cried as she tugged on Emmett's hand, pulling him along as his gaze wandered to a poster on someone's locker door.

"I think it's a fucking awesome task," Jasper drawled out as he slung an arm around Edwards shoulder.

"You only like it because it involves music," I taunted, earning a hurried nod from the blonde boy.

"I think it's a good assignment too," Edward smirked, kissing his boyfriend on the cheek.

"Yeah, but you're a suck-up to Ms. Drays," Rosalie spluttered as her grip on my hand tightened. We burst in through the double doors of the cafeteria, and everyone's attention went to us. Yeah, okay, we were the popular kids of Forks High, but we never let it get to our heads. We quickly got lunch and sat down at our usual table, continuing the conversation.

"C'mon guys, you got to admit, two and a half days to write and partially memorize a seven minute long speech is a trifle tricky." They took in the validity of my point, eventually nodding their heads. "At least I have a rough topic in mind."

Everyone's gazes shot to me, each giving me the look asking 'if you knew what you were doing, why were you complaining'.

"Me too," Rose added, leaning over and giving me a light kiss. "But I need to run it by you first."

I knew from her words that it would somehow involve our relationship, but I didn't care, seeing as we have been public knowledge since day one.

"I suppose I could somehow work lyrics into a speech about my art," Alice muttered, forking a pile of lettuce and bringing it up to her mouth.

"Sport's always a good back up for me… or I could talk about my friends," Emmett explained, and we all agreed on him talking about the group, but in a non-secret spilling way – Emmett was known for not keeping his mouth closed.

Jasper and Edward mumbled under their breaths what they were considering, but none of us really caught what they said. Knowing Jasper, it'd be something to do with music, and Edward would either write about politics or big-headed celebrities. I, however, was going to use the environment as my topic, because during the class, I had the perfect song to go along with it stuck in my head.

We continued to talk for the rest of the lunch period, but all too soon, the dreaded bell rang.

"Do you guys wanna meet up at my place tomorrow and work on the speeches? We could turn it into a sleepover, and get the whole weekend out of it," Alice suggested. She only offered up her place because it was the biggest out of all of our houses – each couple had their own bedroom for when we had a party or sleepover of sorts, and her parents were never home, so we got up to all kinds of shit, and never got into trouble for it.

We all agreed to meet up at the Brandon Manor at 10am the next day, armed with supplies – both school based and sleepover based – and enough booze to get us through the night. We split up and went off to our separate afternoon classes, and as I made my way to Biology, I couldn't stop the dirty thoughts that ran through my head.

_I wonder if practical work will help Rose with her speech…_

The rest of Friday passed in a flurry of lessons and homework. I managed to get all of it, except the speech stuff, done, and managed to cook meals for both tonight and tomorrow night for Charlie. Just as I pulled the lasagna out of the oven to cool, Charlie called through to me from the living room where he was watching some sports match or the other.

"Bella, Rosalie's here." How he could know my girlfriend was here to pick me up for our weekly Friday night date without tearing his eyes away from the television was anyone's guess, but half a minute later, the horn of her car sounded, beckoning me out.

"Okay Dad, thanks. There's lasagna there for tonight and tomorrow. Just reheat in the microwave, and remember no -"

"Foil, yes, I learned from last time," Charlie chuckled. I grabbed my keys and my purse from the table in the living room, before dropping a kiss on his forehead. "Have fun honey."

I waved to him as I left the house, wandering out to Rose's cherry red BMW convertible, a car I so desperately wanted to steal from her – anything was better than my rust-bucket of a Chevy.

"Where are we going tonight?" I asked as she pulled away from the house and began to drive through the streets of Forks.

"My place," she replied, reaching over and taking my hand in hers. "Parent's are out. Don't worry, I have clothes and stuff for you to use for the weekend."

I smiled to myself as she drove the twenty minute journey to her house, just on the line that separated Forks from the Indian Reservation of La Push. She loved her house, because it was ten minutes from the beach, and a lot of our classmates were from the Rez, so she was close enough to visit each weekend, whereas only a few of us could make it down every fortnight.

She pulled into the driveway and stuck the vehicle in park, climbing out of the car at top speed and running to the front door. It might surprise you to hear this, but I actually beat her out of the car and up to the house, a near impossible feat considering I was wearing heels _and _a short skirt.

We stumbled into the house, attached at the lips. I heard the distinct clinking sound of Rose dropping her keys to the floor, and soon I lost all my senses as Rose dragged me up to her room, spending all night showing me just how much she adored my body, and I hers.

Ms. Drays wrote up a list of names on the board, before she turned to us, her ankle length skirt billowing out around her.

"A few things before we move, class. We will be giving our presentations in the auditorium, starting in ten minutes, to the rest of the class, Mr. Cullen's English class, the students who have study hall this period, select teachers and the principal. This is the order in which you will be giving your presentations. There are to be no swaps, changes or 'faking sick' to get out of giving your speech. I want you all to write down the list in your notebooks, and have it with you through each period of the presentations, so you can answer questions, which I will give you before each person begins their talk – this will ensure no cheating." She was a young teacher, two years out of her course, but man, did she have the old-teacher thing down. I looked at the list of names carefully, sighing as I saw just how many speeches we'd be sitting through.

_Swan  
>Masen<br>McCarty  
>Whitlock<br>Hale  
>Cullen<br>Yorkie  
>Mallory<br>Denali, T  
>Newton<br>Stanley  
>Crowley<br>Weber  
>Call<br>Volturi, J  
>Black<br>Ateara  
>Cheney<br>Volturi, A  
>Clearwater<br>Uley  
>Young<br>Denali, K_

"Well fuck," I muttered under my breath, watching as my friends gave me pity-filled looks. I stood, gathering my books and taking Rose's hand, heading for the Auditorium. As soon as we made it there, I was whisked up front to the lectern. I breathed in deeply as I tried to block out all the faces in front of me, trying to ignore all the people who were there to listen to my amazingly crap speech. With one final deep, cleansing breath, a quick glance at my notes, as a side-look to Ms. Drays, I launched into my speech.

I put my all into my presentation, making sure I spoke with diction, clarity and confidence. The words that I wrote mere hours ago fell from my lips, as I told people about the environment and what we were doing to it by living the way we were. As I moved into the lyrics I chose, my eyes focused on each member of the audience, my gaze burrowing into them as I spoke the last few words of my speech.

"What about the bleeding Earth, can't we feel it's wounds? What about nature's worth? It's our planet's womb."

My eyes met those of my circle of friends as my shaky fingers reached for the photo on the lectern, raising it up. The multiple-shot photo showed the changing Earth and how we were losing masses of land to the ocean, the devastation of natural disasters and the like as we continued to treat the world badly.

"What about us?" I ignored the applause and such as I made my way back to my friends, knowing that my message wouldn't have mattered to anyone but them. I smiled as I took my seat between Emmett and Jasper, resting my head on the blonde's shoulder as I watched Edward rise and move to the front of the room.

I suppose in the end none of it mattered to me – whether people got the message of my speech. Because in the end, I get my grade, I'm with my friends, and I know the six of us will be doing our best to help the future of our world, and the future generations.

And hell, the grade I was going to get as I saw the biggest smile ever to be on Ms. Drays' face would be worth it all too.


End file.
